This Connection
by Phosphorescent
Summary: Tag to 10x02: "Recovery." A missing scene between Abby and Kyle.


_Disclaimer: Despite my best efforts, NCIS still doesn't belong to me.__  
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_A/N: I love Abby__, but I've always found her 'voice' very difficult to capture. Still, after 10x02, I really wanted to try my hand at writing her; the below is my attempt at doing so. I'm not particularly satisfied with it, so constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated.  
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_Also, just as an FYI, I'm currently working on another tag for this episode – one dealing with Tony's crisis counseling session with Miles Wolfe – and hope to have it up by the end of the weekend. An update on _Life Out of Order_, on the other hand, probably won't be available for quite a while; the next chapter is giving me a lot of grief._

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"Just take it as a sign, Abby," she tells herself as she exits the shop, trying to push down bitter disappointment and self-recrimination. "You waited too long, it wasn't meant to be. He has his life and you have your life –"

"Excuse me!" a male voice calls, startling her out of her ramblings. "Miss! Wait, wait, wait!"

Abby looks up and sees a young man – her brother (her _brother_!) – jogging over to her.

"I _thought_ that was you," Kyle Davis says, a tentative smile on his face.

She feasts her eyes on him, taking in every small detail that she had forgotten. They have a similar underlying facial bone structure, and similar noses and similar eyes. He gestures with his hands the way she does, even though she doubts he was raised in a deaf household. It's a bit like looking into a mirror, and it is at once bewildering, terrifying, and thrilling.

"Didn't you come into the shop before… a while back?" Kyle asks.

"Last year," Abby says slowly, trying not to get her hopes up too much. "You remember that?"

"Yeah," he says in a rush, "like – like it was yesterday. That… that sounded weird, didn't it?"

God, he even _sounds_ like her.

She reassures him, "Not at all."

"I just didn't know if I was going to see you again. I had no way to find you," Kyle continues.

"Why would you want to find me?" Abby asks cautiously. Nervously. (Hopefully.)

He pauses, moistens his lips nervously, and says, "I don't mean this in a creepy way, but ever since you came in, I… I can't shake this feeling that, that we had a connection or something. I – I don't know why."

Abby smiles, takes a deep breath, and says, "I do. I know why."

He looks at her curiously.

"We're siblings," Abby says. "You're my birth brother."

"Really?" he asks eagerly. "My parents didn't know anything about my birth mother. I'm an only child, but I've always wanted a sibling."

Having expected far more questions, Abby is both taken aback and relieved.

Nodding, she says, "Really."

Kyle rushes forward and wraps her in a hug. It's a bit awkward at first, but Abby quickly relaxes into it. It feels _right_ somehow.

Drawing back, he suddenly says, "Wait. How long have you known?"

"Since last year," Abby admits. "I found out when I went in to donate a kidney, and it turned out that you'd already volunteered yours. We were a 99.9% DNA match. That's – that's around when I figured out that I was adopted, because I knew that my parents would never have given up one of their kids for adoption, but they definitely would have adopt_ed _a kid. Just to be sure, I tested a lock of my mother's hair against my DNA – oh, I'm a forensic scientist, I work at NCIS – that's Naval Criminal Investigative Services, by the way, most people don't know what it stands for – and we weren't a match. I was curious, so I tracked you down. I hope you don't think that's creepy or anything."

"I would have done the same thing," he asks. "But… why didn't you say anything back then?"

Abby shrugs uncomfortably and says, "I – I didn't know if you even _knew_ that you were adopted and I didn't want to step on any toes or anything and I didn't know if you'd want a sister and I was afraid that you wouldn't like me or –"

"Don't be ridiculous!" he says. "How could I _not_ like you?"

Abby grins despite herself and gives him another hug.

She _had_ been ridiculous, hadn't she.

"You know," she says, drawing back from the hug, "it's funny that you should say that. Gibbs told me almost the exact same thing when he tried to convince me to come talk to you."

"Gibbs?" he asks.

Abby beams.

"Oh, you _have_ to meet Gibbs! When do you get off work? We have so much to talk about!"

"I'm off in an hour," Kyle replies.

"Great!" Abby says. "Want to meet up here afterwards then?"

"Yeah," he says, smiling at her.

She finds herself oddly reluctant to leave Kyle's side now that she knows he won't reject her, but she is aware that he needs to get back to work.

"In an hour, then," she says, giving him a parting smile. "I'll just be out here. Waiting. I might grab a cup of something to drink first."

"Try Fullian's just down the block," he says. "They have this awesome caffeinated fruit beverage, Raspberry Rush. Actually, want to just meet up there?"

"Sure."

And, full of anticipation, Abby bounces off towards the coffee shop.

It's going to be a long hour. But she's waited a year for this moment… she can manage one more hour. And in the meantime, there's this Raspberry Rush drink that her brother (_her_ brother!) recommended…


End file.
